Edward Thomas, the poet who died in the First World War, is the subject of this blog and of my novel, A Conscious Englishman. It is about Thomas, his wife Helen, Robert Frost, Eleanor Farjeon and others of the period, and about nature, place and poetry.
'Margaret Keeping's inhabitation of Edward, Robert, Helen and their world is tender and subtle...a lovely novel.'. Robert Macfarlane

Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Steep and around: Edward Thomas country - Churches.

There is a good case for putting two poems at the centre of this post.

'The Manor Farm' was one of two poems of his own which Edward included in his anthology, 'This England', a pocket-sized book intended to be taken by soldiers to the front. The other was 'Haymaking', set in Dymock and in summer. Edna Longley writes:'Like the anthology itself, they seem designed to suggest 'some of the echoes called up by the name of England' and to counter wartime rhetoric that took England's name in vain. Thomas's Summer and Winter scenes, set in long perspectives, aim at a deeper form of cultural resistance.' Here is an extract from the novel:

On Christmas Eve he began to write about
walking in the first February sunshine down towards the glowing rose-coloured
old bricks of Prior’s Dean manor house. It was a modest seventeenth century
house, three stories high, with diamond-paned windows. Its thatched farm
buildings stood alongside. The winter sun brightened the mossy tiles and the
windows sparkled; white doves perched on the roof enjoying the new warmth. The
only sound was the gentle swish of tails from three carthorses leaning over a
gate. As it was Sunday they were at rest.

The church was small, smaller than a barn, but
beside it stood a great ancient yew tree, its complex trunk sculpted and
hollowed into deep red caverns. The harmony of house, farm, church and tree,
the lives of animals in that Sunday silence – the timelessness, the renewing of
it all by the thaw – .....'

And the poem, written from notes of: 'the end of the first warm day in February ....at Prior's Dean, where the Elizabethan house looks across at the primitive little Norman church and its aged yew.' (Whiteman). ﻿

The Manor Farm

The rock-like
mud unfroze a little and rills

Ran and
sparkled down each side of the road

Under the
catkins wagging in the hedge.

But earth
would have her sleep out, spite of the sun;

Nor did I
value that thin gilding beam

More than a
pretty February thing

Till I came
down to the old Manor Farm,

And church and
yew-tree opposite, in age

Its equals and
in size. The church and yew

And farmhouse slept in a Sunday silentness.

The air raised
not a straw. The steep farm roof,

With tiles
duskily glowing, entertained

The mid-day
sun; and up and down the roof

White pigeons
nestled. There was no sound but one.

Three
cart-horses were looking over a gate

Drowsily
through their forelocks, swishing their tails

Against a fly,
a solitary fly.

The Winter's
cheek flushed as if he had drained

Spring,
Summer, and Autumn at a draught

And smiled
quietly. But 'twas not Winter—

Rather a
season of bliss unchangeable

Awakened from
farm and church where it had lain

Safe under
tile and thatch for ages since

This England,
Old already, was called Merry.

*

Steep church itself is part- Norman with a rather odd-looking Victorian belfry. Every year near to March 3rd(Thomas's birthday) the Edward Thomas Fellowship meets in Steep for a walk and ends the day with its annual meeting in the church with readings and music..

﻿

On the south wall are(or were) two small memorial windows, commissioned from Lawrence Whistler in 1978, the anniversary of Thomas's birth.

The left represents a contended Thomas, walker, gardener. The right is the depressive but perceptive Thomas on moving house, into the New House at Wick Green where the wind and mist added to very troubled years, and the window leads down to Arras.
More sadness - that window was smashed in 2010 but may be replaced.

'A MEMORIAL window inside All Saints’ Church in Steep has been smashed by vandals.

Intruders broke into the church sometime overnight between Tuesday, September 28 and Wednesday, September 29 by hurling a piece of masonry from the churchyard through a lancet window in the south wall.The window, designed and engraved by Laurence Whistler, commemorated the famous Steep war poet Edward Thomas. Police are investigating the crime, but in the meantime the vicar of Steep, the Rev John Owen, and fellow members of his parochial church council are finding out if the window can be repaired.Churchgoer David Dobson said: “It was smashed into smithereens, but the pieces have been carefully collected and the original design of the window still exists. They are deciding whether to commission a copy, or whether to consider a different window altogether. Whatever they decide, there is a clear need for greater protection for the windows.” ' Petersfield Post

The New House

NOW first, as I shut the door,
I was alone
In the new house; and the wind
Began to moan.

Old at once was the house,
And I was old;
My ears were teased with the dread
Of what was foretold,

Nights of storm, days of mist, without end;
Sad days when the sun
Shone in vain: old griefs and griefs
Not yet begun.

All was foretold me; naught
Could I foresee;
But I learnt how the wind would sound
After these things should be.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Blog: From the 7th of February the name of the blog will change to 'Reading Edward Thomas, A Conscious Englishman.' The address is readingmyedwardthomas.blogspot.comI will try to run the two together and identical for a while and hope the change will be smooth.ACE publishing. A week to go before publication on 7th February

Frank Egerton and I met on Monday for updating - review questions, a launch plan, Amazon activity, - unexpectedly they have put the novel on sale in the Book Depository pre-publication, unusually for small press publications. It even has Look Inside - so useful it must be admitted, almost like being in a proper book-shop!
Frank mentioned entering for prizes following Linda Newbery saying that it should be entered for the Guardian First Fiction prize.
We also looked at the contract between us, left with me to study.
My one anxiety has concerned small errors I have found in the novel which I hadn't noticed before in spite of really trying to check: my neighbour and former teacher Kate Clanchy said when I mentioned this to her, 'Yes, they only jump out at you when it is in book form.' Frank assures me that few readers will notice, and they will be corrected in the next print, probably in late spring.

About Me

"Start with the Poems, but 'A Conscious Englishman' is a worthwhile addition to the secondary literature".
I'm a former English teacher and Probation Officer, living in Oxford with my husband artist Marc Thompson.